I’m so frustrated that I have to write something. I love Twitter. It’s my main social media outpost, my main information source, and where I connect with a lot of my friends. But Twitter is dying, and it’s all because of you.

Tribes are killing Twitter

I’m a content curator and I spend time every morning reading content and sharing the best of what I find that day, on topics like social media, technology, marketing, and website and mobile design. I look first to Feedly where I can review the latest posts from the bloggers I trust. Then I go to a Twitter List of my favorite Tweeps.

That’s where the problem is. It’s been happening for a while, but today it really drove me crazy. Three tweeps shared the same post with the same title. It sounded like a useful article, but when I clicked to read it, the content was actually mediocre and not very readable.

Continuing to scan my Twitter stream, I kept see the same posts, each tweeted by several people. They weren’t great posts that were being shared because they were uncommonly good. They were average posts being shared because these folks are in the same tribe as the author.

Spam, spam, and more spam

When I first started curating content, I used LinkedIn groups as a source. It took a lot of work to comb through the discussions and find good content. Too often, a headline looked good, but the article behind it was junk.

Later, I added Twitter to the mix. I had better success with Twitter as it was faster to scan the stream and the content shared on Twitter was much better. Over the years, I created a list of other curators who regularly shared good links. Eventually, I abandoned LinkedIn.

In the last six months or so, I’ve seen the quality of the content being shared on Twitter drop dramatically. While it’s still easier to scan the stream than use other social networks, too often clicking a link leads to junk–or at least subpar content.

It’s become a big spam-fest on Twitter. I find myself going back to LinkedIn and also using Google Plus. I’m thinking that I may try to use Facebook more or a third-party tool like Alltop.

You’re part of the problem

I know I’m not alone. I’ve heard you out there complaining about the same thing. Let’s be clear. If you think there’s too much spam, too much arbitrary link-sharing on Twitter, and you’re using a tool like Triberr to auto-tweet links yourself, then you’re being hypocritical. You’re part of the problem.

We all want traffic to our blog, preferably traffic consisting of our target audience. We’re all busy and find it hard to juggle maintaining a presence Twitter, so auto-tweeting seems like a good option. But it’s not. It’s just turning Twitter into a big blogger ad-space.

We are part of the Twitter ecosystem. We get value from promoting our content on Twitter, among other uses of it. But being part of the ecosystem means we also must protect that ecosystem by being responsible about our use of Twitter. The consequence of not being responsible is that Twitter will become less useful, lose users, and therefore stop being valuable for us, too. If you continue to contribute to the problem, you have only yourself to blame when Twitter is no longer viable.

Prisoner’s Dilemma

I don’t really expect you’ll quit, though. It’s a prisoner’s dilemma situation. Everyone else is doing it, so if you don’t, you’re missing the boat. We’ve seen this story play out before in many different venues.

Which is why I’m hoping the jailor is going to step in and solve the prisoner’s dilemma. The best solution would be if Twitter banned auto-tweeting. I’m not talking about scheduled tweets here. It’s a very different thing for you to manually schedule a tweet. You have to make an effort, and if you’re taking the time to schedule the sharing of a link, you’ve probably read the content you’re sharing. The same is true if you’re using a tool like Triberr in manual mode, where you have to approve the share.

I’m talking about auto-tweeting, where an application shares links on your behalf without you having to manually do anything. I’m really, really hoping that Twitter figures out what is happening and bans third-party apps that auto-tweet. After all, Twitter has the most to lose from the practice of flooding streams.

Twitter doesn’t have a good track record of seizing opportunities or identifying and responding to problems. But it’s in their best interest to not let Twitter become a spam-playground. So I hope they will take action this time. It’s also in your best interests. So here’s hoping you’ll help the ecosystem. Take a positive action. Turn off auto-tweeting and tell your fellow tweeps that you’re #notautotweeting.

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Leslie Lewis is not my real name. You don’t need to know my real name, and you may never know it. Here’s why.

I’ve worked in social media since 2005, and I knew I needed a tightly controlled message and presence online. You could Google my real name and find my blog, or find me on Twitter, LinkedIn, Flickr, or Facebook.

Like you, I used my real name, shared real stories, photos, and details from my life. I was as transparent and authentic as I preached to my clients that they needed to be.

All of that ended in early 2010 when someone launched an online smear campaign against me, with allegations that were wholly baseless and untrue but were professionally damaging.

I contacted law enforcement officials, but they were helpless to stop the flow of fake accounts being created in my name due to issues of state, federal and international jurisdiction complications.

After consulting with several lawyers I was told that civil action would be a long, disruptive, and expensive process. In the end I was advised that my best option would be to directly contact Google or LinkedIn every time a new one appeared. Not very practical.

The end of my brand

My career nearly ground to a halt. After several months, I consulted with friends, family and people in the social media community, and I decided I needed to go “underground.” I locked down, and in several cases deleted, my social media presence.

Five years of community building and establishing a brand behind my name were gone. For nine months I had virtually no social media footprint, but at least the attacks finally stopped.

The transparency that we all advocate to our clients was what was used to harm me. While going underground brought an end to the attacks, it has hurt me professionally. Social media strategy is a practical discipline: We show that we are able to do for our clients by doing for ourselves.

In December of 2010 I inched back online, using Twitter with a pseudonym. As I began making and rebuilding connections the pushback I have received from social media professionals on Twitter has been unexpected.

When my email address and Twitter name don’t correspond, I am frequently met with stark skepticism of my intentions or the implication that I am “doing social media wrong.”

As social media professionals we tend to conflate the concepts of “transparency” and “authenticity.” Frequently they are used as synonyms, or, that if one is not present it invalidates the other.

Transparency is not the same as authenticity and authenticity is not dependent on transparency.

Moving forward

In the real world we meet people every day and accept them at face value, rarely stopping to question their identity. In real life we don’t demand the type of immediate transparency of each other that we do online. The neighbor with the unlisted phone number, the friend who goes by his middle name or the parent with a different last name than their child; we don’t (or at least the polite among us don’t) demand explanations of them.

We shrug our shoulders at these incongruities and don’t allow them to take away from our enjoyment of, or the credibility of these individuals. Why then, don’t we do this online? I could just as easily be an SEO mole as the neighbor with the unlisted phone number could be a bank robber. Why don’t we explain away similar incongruities in online identity that we do offline?

These are issues that are not new to online communication, yet they seem to linger. We have all seen social media go wrong and unfortunately we have all seen it used as a weapon of destruction. My situation is, sadly, not all that uncommon. As a profession we need to move towards a framework wherein privacy and security concerns are not trumped by demands for transparency and authenticity.

Don’t we?

Leslie Lewis is a digital media strategist working in public health, social marketing and behavior change at a Washington, DC based
NGO. She’s still trying to get this pseudonym thing worked out and is accepting suggestions

It takes a lot of work to have a company blog and your approach is not a decision to be taken lightly. Your blogging strategy will have a powerful impact on the direction of your entire social media effort.

Some of the best blogs in the world have evolved to support a number of corporate strategies. And that’s where you need to start — assess the strategy, resources. culture, and capabilities of your company. It’s almost trite to say “start with strategy” but it is ESSENTIAL and will save you a lot of pain later. Let’s look at the implications of this decision by comparing three different corporate blogging strategies:

The multiple blogger strategy

A team of bloggers contributes content, with or without attribution.

Advantages

This is the most common approach because it fits well with traditional organizational structures, i.e. “the blog is run by our PR team.” So it’s usually the easiest route to success … and there is something to be said for that.

This strategy can also shine a light on the many voices and talents in your company. MLT Creative does a superb job of this, providing a blog that examines inbound marketing, research, and creative strategy by highlighting various experts on their team.

Multiple bloggers also distributes the workload and provides the best opportunity for frequent, consistent content.

Disadvantages

When you start a blog, all these people in the company will say “Oh yeah, I’ll contribute once a month.” They are big, fat liars.

Managing many moving parts and a content plan can be very complicated.

Being wedded to a schedule may make you inherently less flexible and responsive to external opportunities.

I have rarely seen a corporate blog with multiple bloggers that has been able to establish a real community.

The single blogger strategy

One person is the “face of the company.”

Advantages

If you have a company executive who is a natural communicator and voice of authority, it may represent a unique opportunity to differentiate your brand. What customer would not love getting a first-hand view from a well-known executive? Bill Marriott blogs for his hotel chain. That is an advantage no other hotel brand can touch.

If your goal is to humanize your brand and create customer dialogue, your best bet is to have a dedicated blogger. People want to connect and converse with a real person. It is difficult to ask a question or comment when the author is not even identified.

It’s easier for a single person to develop a blogging voice and competency than an entire team.

Having a single point of responsibility is the most flexible and responsive situation that takes advantage of the rapid and real-time nature of the social web. It also assures that the job is going to get done.

Disadvantages

It may be risky putting all your eggs in one blogging basket. What happens when your celebrity blogger leaves?

Funding a dedicated blogger may be impractical for most companies.

It may limit the scope and variety of content you deliver.

Hybrid approaches

Multiple, single bloggers — IBM has more than 50 blogs featuring individual superstar scientists and engineers. It is the best of both worlds since it features multiple voices but also creates emotional bonds with individuals.

Blogs segmented by market — An emerging best practice is to have multiple company blogs aimed at different demographics. These may use a combination of individuals and teams depending on the market.

Turn the blog over to stakeholders – Patagonia, Starbucks, and Fiskars famously use customers as their bloggers. This can create compelling content, external validation for your brand message, and a great opportunity for engagement.

The {grow} model — That would be me. I offer a variety of content options in a format that could also be adopted by larger and more complex companies. Here is my mix:

As the primary blogger, I establish a voice of authority and an emotional connection with readers that enables community.

I have several regular, paid contributors who provide diverse points of view.

I try to mix it up with guest posts from community members, videos, and cartoons to provide different types of entertaining content and a consistent publishing schedule.

Of course there are lots of other options and approaches and I’d love to hear your take on this in the comment section. What’s working, or not working, for you?

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-Mark Schaefer